Recap of the CrossFit Games Open 2016

The CrossFit Open is officially over! Not gonna lie, I was kind of bummed last Thursday when there wasn’t a live announcement to watch. It’s fun to watch some of the best compete against the each other in a small venue. Those athletes are truly amazing. They work so hard all year long and put everything they have out there just to make it to regionals, and then to hopefully make it to the games.

This year the open was a little different for me. I didn’t actually sign up. I still did all the workouts, but didn’t see the point of giving CrossFit my $20. I know people like to see their name on the leaderboard and compete against people across the world, but I am by no means making it to regionals and I compete against my friends in the box everyday. So it was just like any other day. Last year I looked at some of my friends from my old box to see how they were doing. Honestly, it wasn’t that best for my self-esteem. Some of my friends started CrossFit around the same time as me and were doing a lot better than me in the workouts. And then I didn’t do better on 15.2 than 14.2 the previous year. It really just made me question if I actually improved that much over the year. Which is shitty for me to think because of course I improved. It might not of been physically shown written on paper or with one workout, but I did. I don’t need 5 workouts to specifically tell me how much better of an athlete I am. So that is just my 2 cents about why I didn’t sign up for the open. And I would much rather spend that $20 on a new cute shirt or leggings 😉

I actually really enjoyed this workout! At first I was nervous about the chest 2 bar pull-ups since I figured it would add up to a lot, but they turned out fine. Eight is a manageable set each time and easy to do a few, rest for a second, then jump back up on the bar. The overhead lunge and burpees weren’t bad for me either. The lunges got a little shaky towards the end, but you just power though. I realized when there was about 5 minutes left I could be going faster on the lunges though. So I picked up the pace at the end. Good to know if I ever do it again. I finished with 178 reps RX, or 6 round + 4 C2B pull-ups.

Going into this one I knew it wasn’t geared towards my strong points. I am pretty good at toes 2 bar and have my good days a double-unders, but lifting heavy is not my thing. I am happy at moving lighter loads fast. I can even move 75% of my 1 rep max relatively easily for many reps. Once it gets up to trying to hit my maxes, shit hits the fan. It is probably mostly in my head, but they never go too well. Since 125# is my max clean, I knew I wasn’t going to get any cleans in 3rd round, so my goal was just try to get as far as possible. I ended with 169 reps RX, or 4 cleans at 115#. I was happy with 4 reps at that weight since it was only 10 pounds less than my max.

Workout 16.3Complete as many rounds and reps as possible in 7 minutes of:
10 power snatches
3 bar muscle-ups

Men use 75 lb.
Women use 55 lb.

Bar muscle-ups?! We all thought muscle-ups were coming, but I bet everyone thought they were going to be on the rings. Sneaky. My goal for this workout was to just get a bar muscle-up. And I did!! Even though I just kind of hated on the open, it did make me do a bar muscle-up, which I would have never attempted normally. My gym never programs them, so we never practice. After getting one I will definitely be practicing them more. It is so exhilarating getting something new. The pressure works people. So I finished that workout with 11 reps RX, or 1 bar muscle-up in the first round.

Rowing and wall balls. Horrible combination. Reminds me of 14.4 two years ago. This was the only open workout I didn’t do RX. I used to love deadlifts and it was one of my best lifts (because I could lift the most weight haha!). 155 would of been a piece of cake 2 years ago. My gym here never really does them. If they are in a WOD, they are light weight. So 155# is relatively heavy for me now, especially if I have to do 55 of them in a row. I used 135# for the weight and happy I did. I didn’t have lower back pain the next day and could go about business and usual. The workout was still really challenging too. Once I got to the handstand pushups my body felt like jello. Rowing always does that to me though. I finished with total of 186 reps, or 21 handstand pushups in the first round.

Workout 16.521-18-15-12-9-6-3 reps for time of:
Thrusters
Burpees

Men use 95 lb.
Women use 65 lb.

Hey, workout 14.5! I swear I called this. I knew there was going to be thrusters and there really wasn’t that many burpees so far. I told a few of my friends the week before I thought 14.5 would be repeated and I was right! I wasn’t really that mad about it. I don’t like thrusters, like everyone else, but burpees don’t bother me at all. Obviously my goal was to just beat my time from 2 years ago. And I did! By 3 whole minutes! I finished with a time of 12:09 RX this year. Two years ago it took me 15:14 RX. Looks like my fitness improved since then!

Overall, I was really happy with my performance this year. I have some weakness I need to work on. I also have some strengths that could always improve. It’s safe to say the 2016 CrossFit Open was success this year. Diverse, do-able, and obviously painful (in a good way). Even though I kind of hated on it, it ended up being a super fun 5 weeks of fitness!

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Hey there! I'm Kelly, a twenty something year old lover of food and fitness. I like to create healthy recipes that help fuel my workouts and make my body feel good inside and out. Oh, and I like to get my sweat on! Read More…